A family business built around cutting-edge depression treatment has turned into a high-stakes legal slugfest, with two Palo Alto brothers battling in court over millions tied to a ketamine clinic. Each side claims the other siphoned clinic money, overbilled insurers and treated company credit cards like personal wallets. The fight returned to Santa Clara County Superior Court today, as lawyers showed up yet again to wrangle over the schedule.
Dueling suits and the court timeline
According to Trellis, Reza Ghorieshi sued his brother, Dr. M. Rameen Ghorieshi, in February 2024, alleging breach of contract. Since then, the case has spun off months of motions and discovery skirmishes, with both camps trading shots over accounting records and who hired which lawyer when.
The latest hearing landed in Department 6, where the court’s calendar today lists Judge Rafael Sivilla-Jones as the presiding judge for the week, in line with the status hearing the parties attended.
What the suits allege
In a tangle of complaints and counterclaims, each brother points the finger at the other for grabbing clinic profits and misusing business funds, according to the Palo Alto Daily Post. Court filings and local reporting say the pair inked an April 2022 agreement that promised Reza a salary plus 45% of profits once the clinic cleared $1 million in revenue. The complaint claims the deal generated about $1.4 million in just the first four months of 2023.
Things reportedly fell apart by August 2023, when Rameen says he fired Reza and accused him of using clinic credit cards for personal spending, including thousands of dollars in electronics and family expenses, the Palo Alto Daily Post reports.
The clinic and the treatments
The business at the center of the feud is Palo Alto Mind Body, which markets itself as an interventional psychiatry practice offering IV ketamine infusions and Spravato, an FDA-approved nasal spray. On its site, the clinic says it focuses on treatment-resistant depression, anxiety and PTSD, pitching itself as an option when standard therapies have not worked.
The practice’s FAQs also highlight an arrangement to provide ketamine services for veterans and spell out the prior-authorization legwork staff do with insurers. More details about the clinic’s model and treatment offerings are available from Palo Alto Mind Body.
Legal posture
Online court records list the case as a commercial breach-of-contract dispute, and both sides have been firing off aggressive pretrial motions. A recent effort to knock the other side’s lawyers off the case, based on claims of improperly obtained emails, fell flat, with the court denying the bid and leaving the current attorneys in place.
Summaries of the docket activity and the ruling on disqualification are available through DecisionDepot and Trellis.
What’s next
Both camps were scheduled to appear again before Judge Sivilla-Jones on Tuesday for a status conference focused on picking a trial date, according to the Palo Alto Daily Post. Depending on how the judge sets the calendar, the dispute could head toward a multi-day civil trial or slide into mediation and settlement talks.
Meanwhile, patients and local providers are watching as a once-promising family venture in high-end psychiatric care doubles as a cautionary tale about money, medicine and who controls the books.
